Japanese lawyers on Sunday launched a legal team to help victims of the Fukushima accident seek compensation from the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co., and the national government.

About 30 lawyers, mostly based in the northern Fukushima region, announced at a news conference in Fukushima city that they had set up a new legal advisory team.

In a statement, they vowed to help victims including those engaged in tourism, agriculture and dairy farms whose business has slumped due to fears of radiation from the plant.

A similar team of about 30 lawyers, mostly based in southern Fukushima, was already inaugurated on October 16 as they had been asked for legal advice on compensation from "hundreds" of victims, according to their leader.

The statement said that the team will initially assist some 50 people in demanding Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) and the government fully compensate them, restore their business bases and rebuild their neighbourhoods.

The number of their clients is expected to grow, the statement said.

On Sunday, thousands of people gathered in Fukushima, demanding full compensation for victims of the crisis, and swift decontamination of their neighbourhoods.

The accident has been rated as the worst nuclear crisis since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. The government hopes to stabilise the troubled reactors in a "cold shutdown" by the end of this year, a goal seen by critics as difficult.

More than seven months after the disaster, tens of thousands of people remain evacuated from homes and businesses in a 20 kilometre (12 mile) no-go zone around the plant and in pockets beyond.

Fully decontaminating those areas is expected to take decades.

Both legal teams charged that TEPCO had been negligent in preparing for a major quake and tsunami and the government had been promoting nuclear power generation.

On Friday, TEPCO asked the government for a reported $13 billion to help pay compensation for the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

The company did not reveal the amount of cash it asked for and said the figure would remain secret until it was approved by the government.

However, media reports put the figure at up to one trillion yen, or $13 billion dollars.

Thousands rally for Fukushima compensationTokyo (AFP) Oct 30, 2011 -
Thousands of people angered by Japan's nuclear power plant accident rallied in Fukushima on Sunday to demand full compensation for victims of the crisis, and swift decontamination of their neighbourhoods.

The rally in Fukushima city, some 60 kilometres (40 miles) from the plant, was attended by around 10,000 people, its organisers estimated.

"Our town should be decontaminated at the earliest possible date and our life should be restored as it was before March 11," Tamotsu Baba, mayor of Namie town, told the rally, according to Jiji Press.

A 9.0-magnitude earthquake and monster tsunami on March 11 crippled the plant's cooling systems and sparked reactor meltdowns, a series of explosions and the release of huge amounts of radiation into the environment.

All the 21,000 residents in Namie, just north of the Fukushima Daiichi plant, were forced to evacuate from their homes and remained sheltered in the region, also called Fukushima, and elsewhere in the country.

More than seven months after the disaster, tens of thousands of people remain evacuated from homes and businesses in a 20 kilometre (12 mile) no-go zone around the plant and in pockets beyond.

Nuclear pollution of sea from Fukushima was world's biggestParis (AFP) Oct 27, 2011 France's nuclear monitor said on Thursday that the amount of caesium 137 that leaked into the Pacific from the Fukushima disaster was the greatest single nuclear contamination of the sea ever seen.
But, confirming previous assessments, it said caesium levels had been hugely diluted by ocean currents and, except for near-shore species, posed no discernible threat.
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